Dr. Valdez Pierce has worked as an Associate Professor in the Multilingual/Multicultural Education Program since 1992.  She is also Co-Coordinator of the MME Program, concentrating on developing the CISL/ ESL Teacher Licensure Program. 

 Dr. Valdez Pierce has worked for a number of international, national and federally-funded educational organizations in the Washington, DC metropolitan area since 1980. She has held positions as Senior Evaluation Specialist for the Georgetown University Evaluation Assistance Center, Research Associate/Editor at the Center for Applied Linguistics, Director of National Origin Desegregation Programs for the American University's Mid-Atlantic Equity Center, and Editor/Information Specialist at the National Clearinghouse for Bilingual Education.

Dr. Valdez Pierce is a former middle school teacher of English Language Arts, Reading, and Spanish as well as an Adult Education teacher of English as a second language.  She also taught at the Defense Language Institute (DLI) at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, where her students consisted of adult foreign military personnel in the Air Force, Army, and Navy from over 30 different language groups.

In 1982, she was awarded a Fulbright Grant to Italy to conduct training in Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) with secondary teachers. Dr. Valdez Pierce holds a Ph.D. in Applied Linguistics from Georgetown University.

Dr. Valdez Pierce's latest publication, a teacher resource book written with co-author J. Michael O'Malley, is entitled Authentic Assessment for English Language Learners: Practical Approaches for Teachers (Addison Wesley Longman, 1996). She has had articles published in TESOL Journal, TESOL Matters, and Educational Assessment. She has also authored chapters on assessment appearing in a number of different books. In addition to teaching graduate courses, conducting research, providing professional development workshops through school-university partnerships, and producing publications, Dr. Valdez Pierce serves as a consultant or invited speaker at national, statewide, and local education meetings and conferences each year.

• Assessment
• Language Assessment
• Performance Assessment
• Authentic Assessment
• Curriculum Design
• Reading Strategies Instruction
• Literacy Instruction and Assessment
• Education Policy

• Valdez Pierce, L. (2003). Assessing English Language Learners. Washington, DC: National Education Association.
• Valdez Pierce, L. (2003, June/July/August). Teaching to the Test: Best practice? TESOL Matters 13 (3), 1, 6.
• Valdez Pierce, L. (2003, March/April/May). Accountability and Equity: Compatible Goals of High-Stakes Testing? TESOL Matters 13 (2), 1, 6.
• Valdez Pierce, L. (2003). Assessment. In C.J. Ovando, V. P. Collier, & M.C. Combs (Eds.), Bilingual and ESL Classrooms, 3rd Ed. (pp. 322-357). Boston, MA: McGraw Hill.
• Valdez Pierce, L. (2002, Fall). Performance-Based Assessment: Promoting Achievement for English language learners. ERIC/CLL News Bulletin, Vol. 26, No. 1., pp. 1-3. Washington, DC: ERIC Clearinghouse on Languages and Linguistics.
• Valdez Pierce, L. (2001). Assessment of reading comprehension strategies for intermediate bilingual learners. In S. R. Hurley & J. V. Tinajero (Eds.), Literacy assessment of second language learners (pp. 64-83). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

• Graduate School of Education
• Center for Language and Culture
• Multilingual/Multicultural Education
• Foreign Language and Latin (PK-12)
• English as a Second Language PK-12

No courses taught this semester.

• Seminar in Bilingual Education: Policy (EDUC - 881)
• Special Topics in Education (EDUC - 597)
• Assessment of Language Learners (EDCI - 520)
• Research to Practice (EDCI - 777)
• Linguistics for PreK-12 ESOL Teachers (EDCI - 510)